After two weeks of guerrilla warfare, with their vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance in the firing line and acres of newspapers celebrating Joe Biden’s decision to step aside, the Trump campaign was overjoyed when Kamala Harris finally chose Tim Walz, a governor little known outside his home state of Minnesota.
According to insiders, it gives them the chance to go on the attack again after two difficult weeks.
“Thank you,” was Donald Trump’s two-word verdict on Truth Social.
Behind the scenes, his allies couldn’t hide their joy when Harris picked a governor with a liberal voting record from a state that has been all-Democratic since 1972.
They immediately went on the attack, criticizing his voting record and the way Minnesota was hit by the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020.
Vice President Kamala Harris announced Tuesday that Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz will be her running mate, a decision that was an encouragement to Trump allies who have been on the back foot
They feared she would block the crucial swing state of Pennsylvania by choosing moderate Governor Josh Shapiro.
“Instead of choosing a candidate with charisma and a moderate track record, Kamala caved to the Hamas faction and chose a charismatic black hole with a long record of supporting extremely liberal policies and a history of close ties to China,” a source close to the Trump campaign said, before drawing a comparison to Hillary Clinton’s losing ticket in 2016.
‘Walz is like Tim Kaine, he doesn’t add anything to the ticket.’
Trump’s campaign needed a boost.
After battling all year and building leads in several swing states, the team suddenly came under fire.
Trump survived an assassination attempt and managed to rally the party at its convention in Milwaukee, but the good times came to an end when Biden finally announced his decision to step aside last month.
That decision did not herald weeks of Democratic infighting as they had hoped. Instead, Democrats united behind Vice President Harris and turned their attention to Vance, the MAGA loyalist who had been chosen as Trump’s running mate.
His busy history of fiery TV interviews and inflammatory social media posts has provided fodder for attack ads and negative headlines.
Trump allies said they were shocked that Harris did not pick Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro
Trump himself responded with a two-word message on his Truth Social website
Meanwhile, money flowed to Harris from donors reluctant to back Biden. Even the polls turned her way.
According to an average from the statistics website FiveThirtyEight, she now has a 45.5 percent lead over Trump, to 43.5 percent.
David Urban, a Trump confidant who lives in Pennsylvania, said the real race is now starting and described it as “political malpractice” for Harris not to pick Shapiro.
“He was the best political athlete in this draft class,” said Urban, who has known the governor for years.
Instead of a running mate who could help her win the key state in this year’s election, he said she had chosen “the progressives’ wet dream.”
And she gave Trump’s campaign the perfect opportunity to end the two weeks of missed opportunities and turmoil since Biden left office.
“Today ends the end of that period,” he said. “Today begins reality for the current Harris-Walz ticket, the most progressive ticket in the United States since perhaps Mondale-Ferraro.”
That duo lost by a landslide to Reagan-Bush in 1984.
Vance himself was back on the attack on Tuesday, after defending his own record for two weeks.
“They make an interesting tag team because Tim Walz had rioters set fire to Minneapolis in the summer of 2020. The few people who were caught were released from prison by Kamala Harris,” he told reporters traveling with him on his plane, the Trump Force Two.